Sreesanth, 13 others sent to 5 days police custody

Source :

Last Updated: Thu, May 16, 2013 16:11 hrs

New Delhi: A Delhi court Thursday sent to five days police custody India fast bowler S. Sreesanth as well as his Rajasthan Royals colleagues Ankeet Chavan and Ajit Chandila, all arrested for alleged spot-fixing in the Indian Premier League (IPL).

Besides the trio, Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Lokesh Kumar Sharma also sent to police custody the 11 bookies, arrested by the Special Cell of Delhi Police from Delhi-NCR, Mumbai and Ahmedabad in connection with spot-fixing, which includes bowling no-balls at pre-determined times.

They have been sent to police custody till May 21.

Police had sought seven days police remand of the 14, contending they have collected 55 mobile phones and laptops, and the data from laptops, all which is in code words, needs to be recovered.

They also sough custody for unearthing the entire conspiracy and to know the who are the other people or players involved in the fixing.

Public prosecutor Rajeev Mohan told the court that their custody is also needed to confront them with each other.

Mohan added that payment was made to players through hawala transactions and they had to receive more payment.

"We need to know the channel of hawala transaction and the people involved in the money transaction," the prosecution said.

The fourteen accused, including Sreesath, who came with his face covered, were produced at judge's home around 6.30 p.m. at Saket court complex.

They all were charged under section 420 (Cheating) and 120 (B) (Criminal Conspiracy) of IPC.

Sreesanth's advocate raised concern over his security in police custody and said he be provide extra security.

To this, the judge remarked: "If your client (Sreesanth) is not safe in Special Cell's custody than he can not be safe anywhere, will he get Z+ security now?"

Sreesanth's advocate also denied his involvement in the spot-fixing, saying nothing was recovered from him and police had deliberately involved him in the case. He told the judge that no money had been recovered from Sreesanth.

The prosecution, however, told the court that the accused were involved in spot-fixing in matches on May 5, May 9 and May 15.

The prosecution told the court that telephonic conversations of the accused running into hundreds of hours had been recorded, after which the arrests had been made.

"The planning starting from Delhi. Rajasthan Royal's match held on Wednesday was fixed, which it had lost," Mohan told the judge.